Your open communication on social media with the members is a testament to your commitment and character in forging a stronger union.
Not only in the traditional sense, but also in utilizing the new technologies for advocacy for the classes, unity of purpose, broad activism, instruction on labor history in the U.S. and promoting solidarity with workers everywhere who are being crushed in the Free Market Frankenstein economy.
An open tent for members to democratically have their voices heard promotes innovation, transparency and solidarity; which in turn lets them feel that their importance as union members is not just based on their work history; their union hall not just some temp agency where they can go to find work but also a place to enhance their civic duty and solidarity to their fellow members, family and communities to help forge a better path for all workers.
Open communication and collaboration is a much better system than a closed off, non-transparent, non-activist, non-innovative, top down central bureaucratic system, which only sees workers as pegs to be filled in contractors holes whenever and however they need them.
We have entered a new era of communications, technology, and transparency and the time is now to engage in a new type of thinking.
A thinking that can marshall the forces of the union workers to promote collaboration, the gathering and filtering of new ideas and strategies to promote a healthy activism to better prepare ourselves to make the case to the general public why we are the best defense against the new (since the Reagan years) fundamentalist Free Market Frankenstein capitalism.
All of our leaders should be using the new social media platform to enhance our reputation and standing in the wider communities.
To promote activism and equal rights and justice for all workers (after all is this not what a Labor Leader is, not just someone who takes phone calls and hands out jobs, a temp clerk can fill that position).
With the new social media there is no excuse for Labor Leaders to be silent.
With the Free Market Frankenstein economy wreaking havoc on American workers (indeed, workers around the world) and statistics steadily coming out showing rampant inequality, with the 1% gaining a lion’s share of the gains, while workers earnings remain stagnant, coinciding with the advances of the new social media platforms, which allow for far more avenues to communicate with the general public, and make the moral case for unions need to proliferate.
To be rendered silent in the face of such mounting evidence and vast new ways of communication is to be complicit in the ongoing rape and pillaging of the American working class by Big Rich and Big Business.
Especially for so-called “Labor Leaders”, who are elected and PAID accordingly, presumably to advocate and agitate in defense of and in solidarity with the well-being of their workers.
The shift to a more inclusive union, which mirrors the new ongoing social media platforms, which have rendered old modes of communication and hierarchy obsolete, cumbersome, non-transparent and ineffective, needs to be undertaken.
By releasing ourselves from the vestiges of the old, and keeping the very best of their educated instruction, and integrating in the new ideas, technologies, communications, collaborations, and culture, we can forge a much stronger and deeper solidarity with all of our members and the general public.
Not just focusing on our narrow interests, such as solely plugging in workers to meet contractors needs in the field, but on our common strengths, goals, endeavors as union members.
Making the moral case for workers rights and economic fairness for ordinary Americans; to our communities and the general public, reminding and educating them on the history of unions as a bulwark against the monied interests; the many advances that we have forged for the working class from previous struggles.
Most of all with a renewed commitment to excellence and principles; utilizing the new data driven technologies and social media technologies and culture; opening up the closed bureaucratic system to a more transparent and inclusive union; which encourages making decisions in collaboration with its workers for the public good and appears literally, not just figuratively, as a union that is doggedly in pursuit of economic, social and political justice for workers everywhere.
The Appeal To Safety LLC 